You Are Special

Permit me, if you will, a foray into physics and metaphysics for a moment. You are here, which is to say that you are at this moment alive, breathing, reading, and viewing one piece out of billions of pieces of information in the universe. While there are many other pieces of information out there on other websites, or in books or magazines or printed papers, or on the television, you are right here.

And that’s extremely odd. It’s odd, not because it wasn’t my intent to write this and for you to read it, as you are now, but because, for you to read this, at this moment in time, a series of infinitely complex events had to occur to bring you to this very moment. Any event that didn’t go exactly the way that it did could well have created a result that is contrary to this moment right now.

You are special because all the random collisions of atoms in the universe pushing inexorably or ineffably to this moment created an opportunity that will not happen again. Yes, little actions and choices influenced the path, but those actions and choice were in turn influenced by ineffable events.

You might brush off this moment as circumstance; an unimportant random event of chance not unlike so many others in your life. After all, you read countless things a day, and you’re very busy, and you have so much to do and you have so many needs to be met.

When you think of your players, or you think about monetizing your games, if you’ve followed the conventional ideas of how to market and how to sell, you seek to make a wide net, then you sort and discard from the wide net. You might recognize this as re-imagining the “marketing funnel.”

What happens to these discarded people? After all, you’ve lured them in, you’ve attracted their attention, even if for only that brief moment. It was an opportunity: for that brief moment, you appeared to align with their needs and wants. Are you satisfied that only 2 in every 10 people feel their needs are met? You may never again see those people, so how will you make the biggest impact on them?

The fisherman using a pole and line risks minimal to no by-catch of sensitive creatures, creating a more sustainable means of farming the seas. How might you create a sustainable environment for those potential players to ensure your long-term success?